Arctic Oil & Gas Directory: SEG Gold Medal awarded to Yu Zhang of CGGVeritas

CGGVeritas said July 19 that Yu Zhang, Deputy Global Research Manager, Processing, Imaging & Reservoir, CGGVeritas, has been distinguished with the Society of Exploration Geophysicists’ Virgil Kauffman Gold Medal in recognition of his recent innovative research in true amplitude wave equation migration.

The Virgil Kauffman Gold Medal is awarded to a person who, in the unanimous opinion of the SEG Honors and Awards Committee and the Executive Committee, has recently made an outstanding contribution to the advancement of the science of geophysical exploration.

Yu is recognized for a multitude of recent contributions to seismic migration and inversion in addition to true amplitude wave equation migration, including turning-wave one-way equation migration, improved reverse-time migration and full waveform inversion. True amplitude wave equation migration in particular provides a solid theoretical solution for different types of migration and builds a bridge between imaging and inversion. The concept and method have been applied to the development of high-end imaging techniques, including stable TTI and orthorhombic RTM, RTM 3D gather output and broadband migrations.

Yu is a previous winner of the SEG’s J. Clarence Karcher Award and Best Paper in Geophysics as well as the EAGE’s Bonarelli Award. He has been intensely involved in imaging technology development at CGGVeritas since he joined the company in 1999.